Do you have a landline phone or cell phone only?

[jefferson_dem]

...Just wondering how many voices among ours are not being registered in the polls.

Studies show more Americans are abandoning their landlines and going "cell phone only." This is most common for singles, younger people, renters, and people on the lower end of the economic scale. Of course, pollsters do not call (or are not supposed to call) cell phone users, so they are not included in surveys' sampling frames. Therefore, their attitudes and preferences are not registered in any reported poll results.

[Buzz Clik]

1. I cannot vote in this poll because I dont' have internet access.

[jefferson_dem]

2. In 1996, PEW explored the cell phone only pheonoma and potential political implications - --

They found the populations to be drastically different but...political implications are minimal. I'm not so sure...

The Cell Phone Challenge to Survey Research
National Polls Not Undermined by Growing Cell-Only Population

Released: May 15, 2006

Summary of Findings

A growing number of Americans rely solely on a cell phone for their telephone service, and many more are considering giving up their landline phones. This trend presents a challenge to public opinion polling, which typically relies on a random sample of the population of landline subscribers. A new study of the issue finds that cell-only Americans – an estimated 7%-9% of the general public – are significantly different in many ways from those reachable on a landline. They are younger, less affluent, less likely to be married or to own their home, and more liberal on many political questions.

Yet despite these differences, the absence of this group from traditional telephone surveys has only a minimal impact on the results. Specifically, the study shows that including cell-only respondents with those interviewed from a standard landline sample, and weighting the resulting combined sample to the full U.S. public demographically, changes the overall results of the poll by no more than one percentage point on any of nine key political questions included in the study.

Estimates of the respondents' likely congressional vote this fall, approval of President Bush, opinion about the decision to go to war in Iraq, and other important social and political measures are unaffected when cell-only respondents are blended into the sample. The relatively small size of the cell-only group, along with the demographic weighting performed when it is combined with the landline sample, accounts for the minimal change in the overall findings.

This research effort was undertaken by the Pew Research Center, in conjunction with the Associated Press and AOL, to assess the challenge posed by cell phones to random digit dial surveys. The project entailed a survey of 1,503 U.S. adults, with 752 interviewed in a conventional landline sample and 751 interviewed on their cell phones, using a sample drawn from a nationally representative cell telephone number database. The interviews were conducted March 8-28, 2006 and averaged about 11 minutes in length. Among those interviewed on their cell phones, 200 (27%) said that their cell phone was their only phone. Details about the survey, including response rates, costs, and other issues, are discussed in the body of the report below.

<SNIP>



http://people-press.org/reports/display.php3?ReportID=276

[On the Road]

5. I Work for Verizon Landline

and this is a big, big issue. Fewer landline customers every month. Verizon is spending billions racing to put enough fiber in the ground to replace the line losses with voice, data, and video over fiber.

However, if they're doing random digit surveys, I don't know why cell phones need to be excluded.

[jefferson_dem]

8. That's not surprising, ribofunk.

This study says one in eight adults have no landline and the trajectery is strong.



http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/products/pubs/pubd/hestats/wireless2006/wireless2006.htm

Cell phones are purposely excluded from sampling frames for now. I'm not sure if that's required by law or just common practive. I do know that call from a pollster on my cell phone would not make me happy. Whatever the case, things may change as the number of "cord cutters" continues to grow...

[On the Road]

11. Thank You -- I Had Never Seen That Graph

I have some rental units in a working class part of Baltimore, and let me tell you, nobody has a land line.

But even people without a regular job have a prepaid cell. When you only make seven bucks an hour, it suddenly becomes expendable.

[elocs]

3. I have a landline phone, but do not talk to "pollsters" or telemarketers.

Or those doing "surveys" in the guise of trying to sell something or somebody, or raise money for something or somebody.

[TankLV]

4. Got rid of my land line long ago - doesn't make any sense...

to keep a land line...

[Iris]

6. I have both.

Not really a fan of the cell phone.

[tammywammy]

7. Cell Phone only

I have no use for a land line

[michreject]

9. I have both

I have to have a landline because I have DirecTV.

[Adelante]

10. Cell only

But it's new. I always had a landline in the past.

[Joe Bacon]

12. Got sick and tired of poor landline quality

I used to have decent telephone service until two years ago, every time my phone rang or I tried to call, static was on the line and it kept getting worse. The "repairman' couldn't fix it, so I terminated Pac Bell and went cellular. Haven't looked back and very satisfied with it! Besides, my cell bill is lower than what I was paying to Pacific Bell.

[Withywindle]

13. I see no reason to pay *two* phone bills!

Once I got high-speed internet with the cable company three years ago, I had no need for the landline at all anymore.

LOTS of people I know have gone this route. (demographically: middle- or lower-middle-class 30somethings, urban.)

[AtomicKitten]

14. still holding out on the cell phone

I work at home and don't really need one.

They (or some folks that use them) annoy the bejeezus out of me.

[AZBlue]

16. I only have one for work (which they handed to me) - and I barely use it.

The most annoying thing is the push-to-talk, which pretty much makes the cell phone into a walkie talkie (and isn't the point of the cell phone supposed to have been to move us beyond that ancient technology?). I understand where that service would be useful at construction sites, retail stores, and other large work areas. But when I'm in Target and I have to hear both ends of the most obnoxious call ever from some other shopper, I just want to rip the phone out of their hands and step on it. Plus, for some reason, those are always the cell phone shouters (those who don't realize that you aren't talking into a tin can connected to a string) - and apparently hard-of-hearing too because they also turn the volume up to high.

:rant:

[kineneb]

15. Both. Use cell for long distance; landline for fax & incoming calls.

We do not live near any copy/fax services, so Santa brought us one of those fax/scan/copy printers last Christmas. It has saved us much in gasoline. We also have the low income discount for our landline, which costs us $12/month. A peculiarity of our geography makes some "local" calls actually long distance on the land line, so we don't call out it much.